Por cinco dias (5 days down)

We wrapped up our first week of Spanish classes yesterday. We're so glad we took time in the states to get some tutoring because that helped us out this week. However, are shortly going to be in brand new territory. We spent quite a bit of time yesterday learning how to conjugate the verb "to buy." If you can remember your language arts classes from elementary school, that's what it sounds like: I buy, you buy, we buy, I will buy, we will buy, you will buy, I bought, you bought, we bought, etc. only more complicated. Our teacher, Beatris, is very patient and complimentary so we believe her when she tells us that we're doing well even though it doesn't seem like it to us. It's definitely going to be a long process!

Juntos Together is coming up June 5-12--it's a combined US/El Salvador conference for college students. Stephen has been practicing with the youth band which will play all 5 nights of the conference. The theme song is "Made to Love You" by Toby Mack. We're excited to see people from our home church--there's a group of 15 coming from Abundant Life in Lee's Summit. They are also bringing 3 additional suitcases of our stuff, including more towels, a shower curtain for the guest bathroom, a tablecloth, comforter for our bed (not that we need it, but it will make the room look nicer), more clothes, books and many other miscellaneous items.

Thanks to my son, Jon, I've been making my own bread dough. It's an easy recipe which can stay in the refrigerator for a couple of weeks allowing you to bake whenever you need it. I used it to make pizza dough this week with pretty good success. Space in the kitchen is tight and I don't have a rolling pin, so the dough wasn't pretty, but tasted good. My oven, like others down here, only has one heating element and it's on the top, so it's hard to get a crispy crust. A baking stone would help, but I haven't seen anything like that in the stores down here.

We still have items on our "list" of things to buy whenever we find them including an alarm clock, a ceiling fan for the kitchen, blinds for the windows and a crockpot. We're going to try looking for a vehicle this week (if we have time.) We may switch from a work truck to another type of 4x4 vehicle like a Rav4 or other small SUV.

Well, this is quite an update and even though there's more to say, I need to clean up the breakfast dishes and move a load of laundry from the washer to the dryer . . . . sound familiar?

We are so blessed to see God's hand in all that we're doing. Please pray for changed lives among the college students of VidaNueva as well as the 3 groups from the states. Also pray for Jeff as he prepares the messages for the conference.